


Maybe

by unknowableroom_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-10-13
Updated: 2007-10-13
Packaged: 2019-01-19 16:22:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12413682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unknowableroom_archivist/pseuds/unknowableroom_archivist
Summary: Snape gets over his resistance.





	Maybe

**Author's Note:**

> Note from ChristyCorr, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Unknowable Room](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Unknowable_Room), a Harry Potter archive active from 2005-2016. To preserve the archive, I began manually importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project after May 2017. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Unknowable Room collection profile](http://www.archiveofourown.org/collections/unknowableroom).

    He whispers low in his throat, almost like he is growling. It would not be a shock; he grovels, dog-like, before our master, his eyes wide with guilt and a weakness that leaves him repulsive, so filthy in his turmoil that I can scarcely bear to look at him, much less put my hands upon him, and yet somehow I do. I leave my eyes closed, so his features are obscured by my eyelids and the reddish darkness of the small place we inhabit, together. I grab and thrust and bite, none too careful, for I don't mind if I mar this ruined flesh. So many have already come before me, charted their way down sloping shoulders and round belly, kissed him through his tangle of stubble. I don't feel anything as I lay him on the bed and proceed to tear him apart. It's not love anyway. It'll never be love. Death Eaters don't believe in love, not for all the galleons in a Malfoy bank vault. 

 

    He sneaks out at night, rat-like as suits him, scurrying away quickly on short, quick legs with the gait of a child. He has never attained my height. In school, he stood a head below his friends, even Remus, who was none too tall to begin with and had a tendency to stoop, either from the shame of what he was or the weighty books clutched in his arms. I don't know where Peter goes and I don't care. I will never ask.

 

    One day he goes out with blood on his face, the start of a bruise on his right eye where I punched him, abandoning refinement and grace and magic for one brief moment, striking out with all the force I had. He spoke of Lily, his rough, greedy tongue forcing its way into my mouth in between the words and breaths, emerging so he could insult her again, to laugh at the way she died with her baby in her arms. I think to myself, _but Death Eaters don't believe in love_ , but of course I was not a Death Eater then, and I believed in love so strongly that it made me ache with every step, with every long, heavy look I sent her way down a darkened hallway. She was always with James, red hair gleaming in a way Peter's greying blonde strands never will. He has lost whatever made him darling in school, the yellow hair and rosy cheeks, the innocence he exuded, the naivety. He is still stupid now, foolish and simpering, but innocent he will never be again. Nor will I. Sometimes I hate us both for that. 

 

    Like clockwork, he returns as the sun sinks low. Eagerness shines in his eyes, slightly warming. Just a sliver endearing. His bruise shines muted golden and green in the candlelight, but his eyes are hopeful. Needy. My reflection shines back at me in them, stern and cold. I'm not sure what to say, but his arms go around me and I do not pull away for once, not even with that cold nose pressing against my cheek. I find myself stroking his hair. It is limp like straw, slippery between my fingers. I almost don't feel it when he kisses me, so lightly, very different from the usual gropes and struggles. When I kiss back, I open my mouth until it hurts, driving my tongue into his, having no idea what he wants or what I want, except that the heat of him engulfs me and for once I am not repulsed, nor desperate. Even when he murmurs my name, ruining the fantasy of a female body against mine, forcing me to recognize he is there, I still don't push away. There is no seething, no hatred, despising myself for every move I make. I fall against him with a rough pant, and for once allow him to be the one who lowers me down. My eyes stay open as he kneels before me and unbuckles my trousers, and that night I cry out his name and no other when I come. 

 

    Over the weeks when the snow falls too deeply to trend outside, when we are trapped in our small shelter with its dusty books and little else, I find myself watching him. He is a killer, I know, like me. I feel no fear, but a grudging respect that is alien to me. He smiles one morning, boyishly, as he brings me eggs and tea on a silver tray, proud of himself for cooking it. I wonder if he hated his friends as much as I did, despite the way he hovered at their ankles like a hopeful pup. They were perfect, Gryffindor golden boys, even silent Remus with his watchful eyes. I wonder, was he ever jealous? Of course, he must of been, just as I was. Did he hover, like me, behind corners, waiting in the shadows for a glimpse, duelling hate and admiration every time he laid eyes upon them. 

 

    I wonder if he ever regretted what he did to them - assisting in James' murder, landing Sirius in Azkaban for twelve desperate years, from which he would never quite recover. He ruined Remus' life forever, and Harry's. The answer is in his eyes, those clouds of guilt he hides behind. He was never anything different from me, just another forgotten boy left to his own devices. He gluts himself on power now and so do I, trudging out to murder when I am summoned, and then retreating to my silent thoughts. We both spend so much time lost, even now, it's like nothing has changed at all. I wonder once in a while what it is Peter thinks about, if the silk feel of a girl's hair and the brilliance of her smile still keep him awake twenty years later. Probably not. He cries at night, exhibiting a weakness unbefitting a Dark wizard, with the names of his friends on his lips. I never ask him why, and am profoundly thankful he does not ask me. 

 

    Sometimes he leaves and disappears for days. I pace in his absence, in a house that feels too large and empty, too cold without him. He is not a dream boy and never will be. He is too short for that, too clumsy, with his messy hair and his ignorant heart. He once knew love and threw it away, much as I once did, and there is something there after all, more then waiting and watching and the memories of a rat. I wait for him by the window, my breath blowing up a frost that hides the winter view. Snow flutters slowly down, hiding the darkened road. Muggle cars seldom go by. They prefer paths without twists and turns, where houses line the street with welcoming lights, which we have none of. I draw my cloak close around my shoulders, buttoning it to my neck, because the warming spells I've cast no longer work, and I haven't the heart to try any more. I let my eyes fall closed, expecting I'll dream of Lily, the way I have every day since I was fourteen, but instead I dream of Peter, aimlessly picking his way across the ice, his eyes bright with the guilt that drowns him everyday. Something stirs in me that isn't lust but sends the same heat up my spine. Perhaps it could be love, after all? 


End file.
